New Revelations: Time Shenanigans

[Dualblade]

Personally I'm going to go with "Exarch G'raha's future now exists separately from ours." Mostly cause this makes for a rather obvious xpac area to go to after dealing with Garlemald and the Ascians.

[myahele]

Personally I'm going to go with "Exarch G'raha's future now exists separately from ours." Mostly cause this makes for a rather obvious xpac area to go to after dealing with Garlemald and the Ascians.

I'm going with this for now too.

Also, if future was the 8th Rejoining, shouldn't that mean that the Ascians were able to resurrect Zodiark? So what was he doing during all those centuries assuming he was resurrected? Or maybe he wasn't strong enough to do anything?

I am getting the feeling that messing with time like this will have some dire consequences, but I guess we'll find out in patches to come.

[Dualblade]

I'm going with this for now too.

Also, if future was the 8th Rejoining, shouldn't that mean that the Ascians were able to resurrect Zodiark? So what was he doing during all those centuries assuming he was resurrected? Or maybe he wasn't strong enough to do anything?

I am getting the feeling that messing with time like this will have some dire consequences, but I guess we'll find out in patches to come.

Well it was still in the midst of war, most likely it was nearing the point of having enough souls in the Lifestream for the Ascians to be able to finally do it but still a little longer off. But yes, we have plenty of just this xpac to go, much less the rest of the games life.

On the ethics of sacrificing a timeline to save a shard... having rewatched Urianger's explanation of the Eighth Calamity ('Unto the Truth' cutscene #2), it sounds like the world might be literally dying due to the effects of Black Rose. It not only killed a large percentage of the population but "brought death to the very soil". It's quite possible they are all doomed (or at least believe they are) whether their world continues to exist or not.

It's not that different to the Warriors of Darkness trying to rejoin the First before the flood could destroy it, I suppose - whether that's an acceptable thing or not.

Another reason I think our alternate future will be the focus of an xpac, while the way they went about it could be considered "better" in execution than how Ardbert and co went about it, it's still something that would lead to us wanting to save those who saved us if we could. At least, I know my WoL/D would want to.

[Nalien]

Personally I'm going to go with "Exarch G'raha's future now exists separately from ours." Mostly cause this makes for a rather obvious xpac area to go to after dealing with Garlemald and the Ascians.

I'm woefully behind on the story still, so perhaps this comes up more clearly in some post-MSQ sidequest, but I kind of took the Exarchs "I wonder if that other age continues onward somehow, cut adrift from time's flow?" to be foreshadowing for YoRHa... How else can you describe his original timeline but as a Dark Apocalypse? I imagine if it was cast adrift from time somewhere, and that small remnant is why the Exarch is still with us, we'd be incline to follow that thread to its logical conclusion to save that world as well... Can't stop that Calamity from happening, but we can help shape the aftermath, much like we did following the 7th, thought this time presumably with android waifus...

[Dualblade]

I'm woefully behind on the story still, so perhaps this comes up more clearly in some post-MSQ sidequest, but I kind of took the Exarchs "I wonder if that other age continues onward somehow, cut adrift from time's flow?" to be foreshadowing for YoRHa... How else can you describe his original timeline but as a Dark Apocalypse? I imagine if it was cast adrift from time somewhere, and that small remnant is why the Exarch is still with us, we'd be incline to follow that thread to its logical conclusion to save that world as well... Can't stop that Calamity from happening, but we can help shape the aftermath, much like we did following the 7th, thought this time presumably with android waifus...

It IS a possibility, however currently I am running under the assumption that the machine graveyard mentioned in one of the Dwarf sidequests and the androids mentioned in an Amarout sidequest will be what eventually leads us to it.

Of course it could be that we have that as part of the raid AND the alternate future also coming into play at the same time. Pro tip: Don't inhale any strange dust.

[Nalien]

It IS a possibility, however currently I am running under the assumption that the machine graveyard mentioned in one of the Dwarf sidequests and the androids mentioned in an Amarout sidequest will be what eventually leads us to it.

Of course it could be that we have that as part of the raid AND the alternate future also coming into play at the same time. Pro tip: Don't inhale any strange dust.

My current idea is;

While the Ironworks team on Source-b worked on timetravel, minds on the Garlean side also worked on a "solution". Naturally arriving at a fully autonomous, self replicating Magitek construct to bring peace, by force, and likely attempt to undo the damage caused by Black Rose. Naturally, as is always the case with such things, "bring peace" and "wipe out humanity" become synonymous. Obviously, the First can't really afford to send an army in to try and save Source-b from this scourge, so instead we opt to send in our own machine workforce of android waifus... With the Warrior of Light training them and supervising their mission... and accidentally teaching them humanity and making them self aware... which is already something Warrior of Light-ness has done to animals, so why not androids?

Naturally we'd need our androids to come from somewhere (or someone) on the First. Enter a beard-less Cid to match our lusciously locked Gerolt.

So I don't know, it seems to me like in the "bad future" timeline, Emet and Elidibus might have screwed themselves out of their ultimate goal ten times worse than Igeyorhm ever did. If a Calamity messes up the Source too much, you don't have enough lives left on it to sacrifice to Zodiark, and this is with, what, 5-6 Rejoinings left to go? (I wonder if the Ascians of the Bad Future didn't bother to stop the Ironworks and G'raha because they needed that reset button just as badly, too.)

You know... We're missing the "Sleeping race on the Moon" from FFIV, although one could argue at this point that Zodiark being sealed away there, with the intent to revive sacrificed Ancients works to that point now, but since I'm talking YoRHa... Moon Server... What if our immortal moon wizards spirited away some survivors to out last the Calamity they caused and reseed the planet later?

Sets up a nice late-patch plot twist; "Oh great! There are survivors on Source-b!", "Oh... They worship the Ascians as saviors... Guess we better wipe them out and let these sentient androids we made inherit Source-b".